Within my work on Ecosystems a significant amount of this is through Diagnostics that leads to Discovery.
Over the past month or so I have been focusing on the Healthcare section and through a number of my diagnostic tools assessed GE Healthcare, Siemens Healthineers, Royal Philips, Novartis, Bayer and Roche.
Why Healthcare? If ever the potential for applying Ecosystem thinking and design it would be in Healthcare. Yet there is so much fragmentation, current relationship constraints and design obstacles to. resolve.
I have posted observations on Siemens Healthineers (post here) and Royal Philips recently. Specifically for Royal Philips I did a very extensive Business Case outline over four posts as I took a broader range of my diagnostic tools to apply to them
Here I am focusing on Bayer and Roche, specially through my Nine-dimensional diagnostic. They aim to offer structural truths. They exist whether the organization acknowledges them. The diagnostic does not create them, it makes them visible. The ones outlined here are not part of the total evaluation undertaken, they are an initial snapshot that needs some more detailed input to gain a more definitive result.
The importance within the IIBE is the sequence, handoff, linkage and movements. In this case the nine components shown are here in these results more “stand alone”, indicative of opportunities for organizations to focus and evaluate each component, to recognise the needs to improve or spot the constraints.
The results for Bayer and Roche offered surprising and different results in the stages they are at in Ecosystem design progress
Firstly, let me clarify the aim of the IIBE
The aim of the IIBE is to provide an ecosystem architecture. It turns ecosystems from fragmented networks into intelligent, adaptive systems that can sense, learn and coordinate, so that strategy, capability and value creation move together, not apart. It makes the parts you have as visible and enables those parts needed to be solvable.
So the IIBE architecture aligns actors, partners, capabilities, incentives and value creation to emerge and transform so friction becomes explainable, progress becomes predictable and planned and moving towards where value creation compounds. The IIBE is not a methodology, a stated framework but the architecture you need for seeing, recognising, designing and evolving the ecosystem as an intelligent, adaptive system
For example there is a Architectural Awareness Lens that looks at five dimensions of Ecosystems; dependence, frisction, visibility, governance and ambition. These determine readiness , a level of calibration before diagnosis. This post discusses one diagnostic- the nine dimensional diagnostic and is illustrative of one tool within the IIBE.
So what were the Key strategic findings
This takes their naming and might need the reader to investigate more to gain a deeper understanding.
Bayer
Observation 1 . DSO is the most interesting internal ecosystem architecture experiment in global pharma — and it stops at the organisation boundary. Bayer has effectively designed a self-organising team network internally. The IIBE argument is that the same logic — distributed ownership, 90-day evolution cycles, mission-led coordination — applied to the external partner layer would create the healthcare ecosystem architecture the industry does not yet have if the DSO thesis was extended outward- See the DSO Short Guide. I think Bill Anderson (the Bayer CEO) would recognize this argument immediately.
Observation 2. The data partnership network — FinnGen, PRECISE, Vanderbilt — is an ecosystem intelligence asset being used as a pipeline acceleration tool. Three global data partnerships covering Finnish, Singaporean and US patient populations represent the embryo of a global real-world evidence ecosystem.
Currently the data flows inward to accelerate Bayer’s own pipeline. An ecosystem architecture would ask: what value does this intelligence create when it flows outward to governed partners? The answer could define a new category of healthcare intelligence orchestration.
Observation 3. Ghaith Sankari’s AI in healthcare and HEOR role is the most precise IIBE entry point at BayerHealth Economics and Outcomes Research at the intersection of AI is exactly where the data intelligence ecosystem argument lands most directly. HEOR needs multi-actor data flows — payer, provider, pharma, patient — to produce meaningful real-world evidence. That is an ecosystem architecture problem disguised as a data analytics problem. Sankari would recognise this framing immediately.
Roche
Observation 1. navify is the most ecosystem-advanced platform architecture in healthcare diagnostics — and its governance design has not kept pace with its scale1,500+ digital placements and an open AI developer environment is genuine ecosystem traction.
The architectural gap is in how value is governed across those 1,500 relationships — how conflicts are resolved, how learning from one deployment reaches others, how the platform evolves in response to emergent partner signals. This is precisely the Living Bridge gap, defined by IIBE in the Orchestration and Dynamics approach, that could be built into any Ecosystem architecture.
I would suggest this is the type of conversation Carlien Viljoen in her role for External Ecosystem Strategy and Jörg Hächler as Head of Innovation Management at Roche Daignostics are most likely already feeling.
Observation 2. The Flatiron structural tension is the single most important unresolved ecosystem design question at RocheFlatiron’s real-world evidence platform is most valuable when it operates as an independent trusted neutral node across pharma, payer and provider actors. Roche’s ownership structurally limits that neutrality — competitors will not contribute to a platform owned by a competitor. This is a governance architecture problem, not a commercial one. An IIBE solution — a trust architecture that creates structural independence within Roche ownership — would unlock significant value currently being surrendered.
Within this brief diagnostic I have taken the Nine Dimensions as the discovery lens
The IIBE uses the nine dimensions to obtain an “emergence sequence” on how competitive advantage builds in ecosystems. This is layer by layer, enabling the next. The importance of building out the foundation layers create the conditions that make a competitive Moat form.
Nine dimensions · Bayer (B) vs Roche (R) · scored 0–10
1 · Strategic intent & ecosystem purpose
Bayer 6 Roche 8
Bayer’s DSO model signals internal ecosystem thinking but the external ecosystem narrative is pipeline-first. “Health for all, Hunger for none” is mission language, not ecosystem architecture language.
Roche’s strategy explicitly names ecosystem as the operating model — “from prevention to monitoring” across a governed partner network — and has operationalised it through navify and cobas platforms.
2 · Value architecture & proposition design
Bayer 5 Roche 7
Bayer’s partnerships with Vanderbilt, FinnGen and PRECISE show data ecosystem intent but the value proposition is still fundamentally product-centred — pipeline assets generating revenue.
Roche’s navify Digital Pathology Open Environment and cobas digital ecosystem demonstrate genuine platform value design — third-party developers building on Roche infrastructure, value accruing to the network.
3 · Partner & actor orchestration
Bayer 4 Roche 7
Bayer orchestrates bilateral partnerships well — Ginkgo Bioworks, Kumquat Biosciences, PRECISE — but has no multi-actor network governance layer. Partners do not create value for each other through Bayer infrastructure.
Roche’s navify approach — inviting AI developers to integrate algorithms into an open environment — is the closest thing to genuine third-party orchestration in the sector. Still platform logic rather than full ecosystem governance but structurally further ahead.
4 · Data intelligence & knowledge flows
Bayer 7 Roche 9
Bayer’s global data partnerships — FinnGen, PRECISE, Vanderbilt — and AI-driven analytics pipeline represent serious data intelligence investment.
Roche operates at a different level: Apollo for data unification across the group, Flatiron for real-world evidence, Foundation Medicine for genomic profiling, the lab-in-the-loop methodology at Genentech, and navify as the intelligence surface for partners. The data estate is extraordinary. The gap is in flowing it across a governed multi-actor network.
5 · Governance & trust architecture
Bayer 6 Roche 7
Bayer’s DSO model is the most interesting governance development in the sector — decentralising decision-making to 90-day mission-led teams is an internal ecosystem governance architecture. The IIBE question is whether that internal model extends to the partner layer. Currently it does not.
Roche’s AI Trust and Ethics framework and regulatory compliance architecture (DiGA pathway alignment) show external governance investment.
Partner-layer governance remains underdeveloped at both companies.
6 · Innovation architecture & emergence capacity
Bayer 6 Roche 8
Bayer’s innovation accelerators and lab partnerships show intent but emergence — value appearing spontaneously from partner interactions — is not yet designed for.
Roche’s open navify environment is the most visible example in healthcare of deliberately designing for emergent third-party innovation. 1,500+ digital placements in the navify ecosystem signals real traction. The question is whether emergent innovations are being re-routed back into the architecture or remaining siloed in individual partner relationships.
7 · Resilience & adaptive capacity
Bayer 5 Roche 7
Bayer’s resilience is currently stressed — glyphosate litigation, Xarelto loss of exclusivity, high debt levels — making ecosystem investment harder to prioritise. The DSO restructure is partly a resilience play, but €29.8B net debt constrains strategic flexibility.
Roche’s three-division structure (Pharma, Diagnostics, Roche Information Solutions) and global geographic distribution provide strong structural resilience. The Flatiron structural tension — pharma ownership limiting RWE platform growth — is the primary resilience vulnerability.
8 · Moat architecture & competitive positioning
Bayer 6 Roche 8
Bayer’s moats are product-based — pipeline depth, crop science position, Kerendia/Nubeqa growth. Network-effect moats are nascent.
Roche’s cobas installed base, navify platform switching costs, Foundation Medicine genomic data depth, and Flatiron real-world evidence repository together create a multi-layered moat structure that approaches genuine ecosystem lock-in.
The moat that remains uncaptured at both companies is the intelligence orchestration moat — where the governing node of a healthcare intelligence network becomes structurally irreplaceable.
9 · Dynamic orchestration & evolution capacity
Bayer 4 Roche 6
The critical gap at both companies. Bayer’s DSO 90-day cycles create internal evolution capacity but external ecosystem evolution — the actor network adapting in response to emergent signals — is not designed for.
Roche’s new Chief Digital Technology Officer role (Wafaa Mamilli, February 2025, reporting directly to CEO Schinecker) is the most significant structural signal in either company: a dedicated C-suite function for digital ecosystem orchestration. It is an early institutional signal, not yet a full Living Bridge architecture as framed by the IIBE needs.
So in summary from the anaylsis- focal points needing discussion
- Bayer’s DSO model is the most structurally interesting experiment in pharma Still missing the explicit cross-partner orchestration layer.
- Bayer’s strategy under Anderson is pipeline rejuvenation plus organisational redesign — both are internal priorities with ecosystem implications but neither is explicitly an ecosystem strategy.
- Bayer’s external orientation is primarily pharma bilateral — licensing deals, co-development agreements, data partnerships.
- Bayer’s DSO 90-day cycles are the most sophisticated internal adaptive mechanism in the sector. The question the IIBE framework asks is whether that adaptation extends to the partner network
- Roche’s three-division structure plus dedicated CDTO role plus navify platform layer creates a more recognisable ecosystem structural stack
- Roche CEO Schinecker’s digital-first mandate and the Mamilli CDTO appointment signal genuine strategic commitment to ecosystem architecture.
- Roche’s external orientation is the strongest of all healthcare cases studied — navify’s 1,500+ digital placements, cobas ecosystem
- Roche’s Mamilli appointment and digital-first mandate create the institutional conditions for adaptive capacity
In applying a range of Diagnostics and Discovery lens you can get a very clear orientation and points of discussion and further anaylsis. The IIBE does not offer solutions, it points where the Ecosystem design and value would have greatest gain and impact.
Further reading on my evaluations of the Healthcare sector
Please visit the four part series on Royal Philips for different lens evaluations that provide accumulating Enterprise Debt, then a post in competive context on comparing Healthineers, GE Helathcare and Royal Philips on this nine dimensions, also questioning the Philips operating logic if you are building Ecosystems, and grouping the Philips Architecture through the IIBE four lens. Then a focus on Siemens Healthineers “are missing a beat or two” and finally a more general Heatlhcare post “From Adapting to Emerging for Healthcare. Moving Data and Intelligence into Knowledge and Value”
Ecosystems fundamentally change how you manage. The struggle within the Healthcare sector is what to give up, what to invest into and how to redesign to have a greater compounding value from this.